Learn mandarin - Rocker's sad show a lesson to media hounds

Opinion / Raymond Zhou

Rocker's sad show a lesson to media hounds
By Raymond Zhou (China Daily)
Updated: 2006-05-13 06:57

Would you be surprised by some erratic behaviour of a rock 'n' roll star?

Obviously, many were caught off guard when news of Dou Wei rampaging a
newsroom became the entertainment story of the day.

On Wednesday afternoon, Dou, a member of a local band, marched into the
office of The Beijing News and demanded to meet a reporter who recently
wrote about him.

According to news reports, Dou Wei smashed a computer, a disk player and
some windows. Later, he returned to set fire to a car that was parked
outside of the building. The newspaper called the police and Dou was
detained.

In Thursday's edition, The Beijing News said that the two articles Dou
disputed were both based on interviews with him and people directly
involved in the stories.

While rock singers are not known for their rationality, what Dou did was
clearly out of line and beyond what is civilly and legally acceptable. He
should have demanded an apology or filed a lawsuit if he truly felt he
was defamed.

That said, one must admit that, in the larger scheme of entertainer-press
relations, Dou Wei has been a victim of China's burgeoning and chaotic
entertainment media.

Dou sealed his fate in 1996 when he married pop diva Faye Wong (Wang
Fei). They divorced three years later, but his name is forever associated
with hers.

Dou used to be a promising and talented singer in a well-regarded rock
band. However, for years, his stardom has been in decline while his
ex-wife reigns supreme in the public eye and is the target of relentless
paparazzi even though she has not been active in the scene for quite a
while.

It is almost a conspiracy that the nation's tabloids have got into the
habit of portraying Dou as the failure and the sad contrast to his former
wife's glory. Some reports use melodramatic terms like "wife leaving, kid
separating" to describe his situation.

One could almost see the gloating and the smirking when they mention that
Dou pays his other ex-wife 500 yuan (US$63) in monthly alimony and is
paid only 200 yuan (US$25) for each gig.

A performer with such limited earning power will never get his name
printed in the entertainment pages no matter what publicity stunt he
employs. But Dou has pulled off the biggest feat of all and inadvertently
became the reluctant Eddie Fisher to Wong's Elizabeth Taylor.

Dou should have learned to ignore the buzzing and rumbling of the gossip
mill. Sadly, he is unable to remain aloof of what others say about him.
As recently as last April, he was summoning reporters and sitting for
interviews, during which he would make outrageous claims about people
around him.

One thing is for sure: He is not cut out for life as a celebrity. He
speaks his mind, which accentuates and exacerbates public perceptions of
him that have been droned in and reinforced by media reports. In other
words, he has turned himself into fodder for the ever-expanding celebrity
machine.

Maybe there should be a school for celebrities - I don't know whether the
Beijing Film Academy has courses on how to feed lines to the press that
reflect glowingly on entertainers. People like Dou should receive
training on deflecting damaging innuendos and not let a little bad
publicity get on their nerves.

It is time that Dou sought psychiatric counselling. And it is also time
that the nation's entertainment reporters leave alone those who do not
want to be exploited by the glaring light.

Email: raymondzhou@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 05/13/2006 page4)

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